two

You're looking high strung sugar. Why don't you sink a little bit?Into the sea of sweat, our skin can spit.It was good to keep me guessing because you know I hate attention, But can we get down to it? Can we get down to it?

Memories rush forward; an empty bar stool, yes I’m livin' at a pace that kills echoing through the place, amber liquid trembling against the brim of a chipped shot glass, a worn and scarred mahogany bar rough under his fingers.

Rudy. The demon in that bar was named Rudy. Sam shakes his head in disbelief, and wait a minute, he called that girl, that girl, he called her Sam. How could I not remember?

No way, no how. I did not have sex with her, Sam thinks, cold moisture breaking out along his brow. That was a dream, an alcoholic-fueled hallucination. I didn’t try to exorcise some demon named Rudy and we didn’t—not in the Impala. Not with her. I woke up the next morning hung over as hell and alone.

But he’s pretty sure he remembers what she tastes like.

Dean falls into a kitchen chair and wipes a hand down his face. “First of all, I didn’t do anything. She kissed me. And second of all, no, she’s not.”

Sam pulls a mug of coffee down from a cabinet, slamming it shut. The skin on his back is crawling, trying to remember, to put together frayed pieces of a weird night last year when he was so fucking drunk and just looking for another bottle. That girl, that girl in the bar playing Dean’s songs, that girl who jumped him in the alley; that girl he fucked in the back seat of the Impala—

He spread her beneath him, slowly entering her, filling her up, eyes closed at the delicious friction, the softness of her cunt surrounding him, clenching him tight. She’d begun to shake under him, driving his cock in deeper, her legs coming up to wrap behind his back, toes bent against the roof of the Impala, opening herself to him more. He’d hitched an arm under her knee, forcing her leg onto his shoulder and pounded into her, the entire car rocking, her hands braced against the window behind her, pushing back against him. He breathed into her, his forehead resting against hers, her open mouth tasting like beer, blood, sulfur.

She shifted them until she was in his lap, fucking against him hard, pulling her own orgasm from his body, her hand wound tight in his hair, pulling his head back. Then, the sudden sharp pain of her teeth against his shoulder, his blood on her tongue when she kissed him again.

—was that her? Holy fuck, he thinks, pouring Dean a cup of black coffee, banging it down in front of his brother. “I didn’t see you putting up any kind of fight. And if she’s not our sister, then what the hell is she?”

Dean takes a gulp of coffee, sticking his tongue out for a moment against the heat. “She’s you, asshole.”

And I fucked her, Sam thinks, flushing first and then cold, the blood draining from his face. He pulls out the chair across from Dean, wiping his mouth, sitting down hard. I had motherfucking sex with myself, you wanna tell Dean about taking masturbation to a whole new level? “And that makes it okay?”

“No, Sam. Jesus-fucking-Christ, of course it doesn’t make it okay. Why, you jealous?” Dean asks, rubbing the tension line between his eyes. “Christ, your face is all white. Really? You need to calm the fuck down; it’s not that big of a deal. Just because she’s girl-you doesn’t make it okay,” he repeats, staring at the tabletop. “It just tells me we’re as fucked there as we are here.”

Sam thinks: we are fucked in so many ways.

Dean looks up at Sam and smiles sideways. “Girl can kiss, I’ll give her that.”

You have no idea just how good she is, Sam remembers, cock twitching, but he says, “Don’t go there.”

Sometimes it's like someone took a knife babyEdgy and dull and cut a six-inch valleyThrough the middle of my skullAt night I wake up with the sheets soaking wetAnd a freight train running through theMiddle of my head

Castiel looks over at the wood pile, his stoic gaze finding Sam in the woods, wielding an ax against a small sapling, thwack, thwack, thwack loud in the eerie silence. “Lucifer has been quiet lately. Has your brother—”

“No,” Dean stands straight and wipes his forearm across his sweaty forehead. “There’s been no contact. And there never will be, if I got anything to say about it.”

“You should be out there, fighting. Not here.”

“Preaching to the choir here,” Dean says. “But we’ve got to help Bobby shore up for the winter. We take care of him now and we’ve got a place to stay when we need it.”

Dean guffaws loud enough the noise in the woods stops for a moment before starting again. “What? You mean you don’t know about girl Sam showing up dead on Bobby’s doorstep?”

Castiel’s eyes narrow. “I don’t understand.”

“I mean,” Dean says, turning away to throw another log on the pile. “That the other day, a girl was dumped dead on Bobby’s porch.” Dean grabs a canteen from the ground and finishes it before speaking again. “Then a bullet pops out of her head and she gasps back to life before our eyes. Says her name is Samuel Winchester.”

“What can be the meaning of this?”

Dean pulls a face and tosses the empty canteen into the wheelbarrow, turning to pick up another log. “Hell if I know. We were hoping you could shed a little divine light on the subject.”

He turns back around. Castiel’s gone.

Don’t fret precious I’m hereStep away from the windowAnd go back to sleepSafe from pain, and truth and choice and other poison devils,See they don’t give a fuck about youLike I do

her

Sam wipes her hands down her face, takes a deep breath and stands. All right, enough of this feeling sorry for yourself bullshit. Shouldn’t fucking matter that this Dean here doesn’t know you. End game hasn’t changed, still got an Apocalypse going on out there, still got people to save, monsters to hunt.

And those guys out there are the only ones who can help you get back home.

Stretching, she winces, muscles pulling and complaining. She bends over and touches her toes. With a sigh, she drops down onto her knees and falls forwards, settling into the old familiar pushups. Dad counts off in her head, coaxing and cajoling her into just five more until breathless, she stops at one hundred.

She smiles at a sudden memory of the old man dancing with her in his arms, singing off-key: ‘Oh girl, I'd be in trouble if you left me now, 'Cause I don't know where to look for love, I just don't know how’. God, how old was she then, three, four? Lacing her Chucks, she wishes the old man was here, never thought she’d admit it, but she misses him like crazy. Misses her cross trainers too, because Dad’s in her head telling her to knock the pansy ass-Mary Sue shit off and do five miles. She wants to run.

“Give me something to do,” she pleads with Bobby a few minutes later. Rolling her eyes at his clouded expression and ignoring the butcher knife and apron, she puts her hands on her hips. Looking down at him from under her lashes, she catches his flinch of recognition and begs, “Come on. I’m going crazy. Please.”

“Smart idea, Sam,” she murmurs, pushing open the rolling door to one of the outbuildings fifteen minutes later. “Beg for something to do. Oh, he gave you something to do all right, motherfucker.”

Okay, so she’d been thinking research or maybe monitoring the shortwave radio for news. Only Bobby would send her outside to do manual labor. They’re right where he said they’d be, twenty red, empty gasoline containers needing to be filled and dumped into oil drums stashed away in the yard.

They got things to hunt, an apocalypse to stop and not enough fuel in the tanks to get it done.

She stares at them for a moment, her long, gray shadow stretching like a finger across the dusty concrete floor. Placing her hands on her hips, she breathes out through her nose once before tying her hair back into a messy knot with an elastic rubber band. Grabbing gas cans as quick as she can, she lines them up in the dirt along the corrugated metal wall of the barn.

Sam stares down at the dirty and cruddy length of clear plastic tubing Bobby handed her before sending her out in the yard, gagging at the thought of putting it near her mouth. She strides back to the house, pulling a pilfered steak knife from her back pocket, kneeling by back steps.

“Oops,” she whispers, cutting a four foot length from the green garden hose, “so sorry.” If the old coot wants her to siphon gasoline from junked cars in the lot she sure as hell won’t be doing it with a nasty old piece of tubing that looks like it’s been shoved up someone’s ass and shit down.

Two hours later, she’s wiping her tongue on the shoulder of her t-shirt and cursing Bobby a blue streak in her head. The car she’s working on is empty and she pulls the hose from the gas tank with a jerk, throwing it over her shoulder, wetness seeping against the back of her thighs. Hmm, she thinks, wonder if Sam’s as good at getting gasoline out of denim as he is with blood.

Picking up the nearly empty container, she moves onto another row of cars, stopping at the sight of Sam and Dean arguing at the end of the row. They’re in each other’s faces; Sam’s fist clenched in Dean’s shirt at the chest, his thigh between Dean’s legs.

She must have made some noise because they look over, stop talking and step away from each other. Sam puts his hands on his hips, mouth set in a hard frown. Dean glares her way before stalking off, Sam giving her a tight smile before turning and following him.

Blowing out her breath, she wonders if the argument revolved around her, or if they’ve got their own angst-filled bullshit between them. Surprise jealousy hisses like a spitting snake through her body. She recognized that look on Dean’s face, was used to seeing it when they argued, usually just before he pushed her up against something and fucked her hard.

Enough, she thinks. Stop thinking about them for five fucking minutes and finish the job you were sent out here to do. So what if they’re fucking, you’ve got no right to feel jealous. He’s not your Dean, he belongs to this Sam. You’ve got no past with him. Three days ago you weren’t here, remember?

Bobby gave her a job to do and she’s got two more gas containers to go and she’s done. So what if her mouth tastes like ass and she smells like a gas station, maybe if she finishes it without complaint, it’ll be a step in starting to trust her, a step in getting them to help her get home. Sam works up a mouthful of gasoline flavored spit and hawks it at the ground, leaning against a semi-crushed car in the shade.

She’s scratching at her sweaty scalp with one hand and feeding the tube into the gas tank with the other when she hears it, a low; almost-moan ruffling loose wisps of hair across her face. Pausing, she stands straight and pulls the steak knife out of her back pocket. Hands on her hips, she sighs, staring back the way she came. She’s farther from the house than she realizes, almost to the silent, empty road and she’s alone. Moving softly, her back to the cool metal, she eases around the cars until the sparse line of trees separating the yard from the road is before her.

The wind carries the moan towards her again and she straightens, trying to discern whether it’s human or animal. Or something worse.

Tones of umber and moss fill the forest across the road, the burgeoning shadows a dusky and whispery purple, the fiery sun breaking through the cloud cover and setting to the west. A breeze whispers through the trees and she shivers, hair wafting away from her face.

Moving through the trees, she stops at the edge of the road, her toe nudging the lip of blacktop. Glancing left and then right, she stares hard at the edge of forest in front of her, shadows dancing within the trees. Every instinct in her body is telling her to turn around, go back, run.

The whispering starts as soon as she puts her foot down. She inhales sharply, ignoring it, telling herself it’s the wind or the leaves, taking another step and shivering. She looks up at the sky and crosses her arms against her chest. Shadows dart behind the trees, hundreds of leaves suddenly blowing across the road. Undoing the arms of the hoodie, she pulls it on, shivering again as another gust of wind blows into her from behind.

“Sam,” the trees whisper, the fallen leaves swirling and crunching around her, “Samsamsammysamsammysamsam,” and she stops, fingers moving on the hilt of the knife, flipping it in her hand, the blade flat against her wrist.

“Come on, fuckers,” she murmurs under her breath, turning slowly in a circle.

A man smiles down at her, hands in the front pockets of his jeans. His skin is—she covers her mouth with the back of her hand, because holy fuck, there’s patches of skin rotting on his face—but his eyes are bright blue, intelligent, genial. Richie Cunningham, Ralph Malph and Potsie Webber all rolled into one, Golly gee whiz, Officer Krupke, I ain't no delinquent. But terror ripples down her spine and her stomach lurches, something hot and loose giving away inside.

Lucifer.

His eyes glide over her face, faint concern furrowing his brow. “You look…unwell.”

Sam lowers the knife. “What do you want?” she whispers, fear crawling over her skin like tiny microscopic cockroaches.

“I just want your happiness, Sam. I owe you that much, I owe both of you that much. Don’t you want to be happy, Sam?”

“You, Sam. I'm here for you. If you only knew how much I respect and am in awe of you. How much of my gratitude I owe you.”

“What are you talking about,” she asks, glancing behind her and backing away from him. “I didn’t ask to be here. I don’t want to be here. Don’t you fucking thank me; I didn’t have anything to do with this apocalypse, this isn’t my fight.”

“I’m thankful you were born, little girl. Do you have any idea how many different dimensions I had to visit before I found you? How rare you are?” Lucifer shakes his head. “And for you and Dean to be just as damaged there, as easily manipulated? It was if the heavens opened up and shined down on me.” Lucifer smiles coyly and raises his hands to the sky.

“Tell me about your demon buddy, Rudy. Did he brush your hair back while you fed from him? Did you moan and swear you were only doing it so you could grow up big and strong? Strong enough to kill Lilith, not because you secretly loved it? You did though, didn’t you? You can tell me,” Lucifer cocks his head to the side. “He got you strong enough to release me and then you and Dean shoved that knife in his gut. Kind of a poetic justice, don’t you say?”

Lucifer mock frowns, the edges of the skin around the host’s mouth cracking, “Or is it an ironic twist of fate?” He temples his fingers and taps them against his chin. “I just got to know, did you fuck him, Sammy? Did you fuck Rudy?”

Sam shakes her head violently, hands clenching into fists at her sides.

Lucifer looks at the ground and takes a step to the right. “You see, in this reality, she was a pretty little dark haired demon named Ruby and its funny; you know how things differ from world to world. Ruby loved fucking this Sammy until his hot come filled her up, loved the feel of his mouth on the skin of her host, his lips sucking blood from the cuts she scored just for him.”

“Stop,” she moans, putting up her hands, warding him off. “Why are you telling me this?”

“See, it really had nothing to do with you, personally. It was him, not you.” Lucifer leans forwards and stage whispers, “I think Rudy was using you to get to me.”

She swallows over the dry lump in her throat. “You think?”

“At least Ruby here loved this Sam the only way a demon can, with blood, fire and hatred. She was so sure when I walked the earth, I’d be so grateful to both for releasing me and they’d be rewarded. She thought she’d get a happy ever after; me in Sam’s body. But poor Ruby, she’s dead and gone.” Lucifer shoves his hands back in his front pockets. “So, I’m going to do something for you instead.”

Sam’s sob escapes before she can muffle it behind her fist. She wants to run, but he’s got her rooted to the spot, unable to move, unable to look away from him.

“Don’t you want to know why he shot you in the head? Do you think it’s because Dean believed you fucked Rudy? Personally, I think it was because he found the positive test in the bathroom trash.”

“See, the thing about Dean is, he knows demons lie. But he also knows that sometimes they tell the truth and let’s not forget you chose Rudy over him, after all; left him broken in that hotel room. And rumors, well, you know how rumors are, especially when they’re started by my followers. What do you think was easier for him to believe? That you were pregnant by him or by a demon?”

Sam’s knees weaken, and she crumples to the ground, tragedy breaking her open. Falling forward, she stares at the blacktop, vision blurring and fading. Stomach lurching; she dry-heaves hard, saliva falling from her lips in a long, glistening thread to the blacktop.

She remembers Dean catching up with her here, the words he’s vomiting from his mouth twisting and shattering her heart on the road. She grips the knife tighter, a memory thrusting forward, Dean shoving her away from him and she’s falling, falling, falling.

Suddenly, she’s staring at a rust discoloration spreading along the tar. She presses her hand onto the road, gravel rough against her palm, the growing pool of blood sliding over her hand, into her knees and staining her jeans, spreading all around her.

This is where he broke her heart and cut her down, where—Dean—pulled the trigger.

Head ricocheting back, she stumbles as the world blurs by, mouth struggling to cry out his name. Her body hurtles to the ground, pain blossoming, angry red flowers spreading before her along the tar topped road. Warm copper and iron fill her mouth, the concrete-colored sky close, darkness descending.

Sam wills her mind to just fucking break already.

“Sammy, I think being dead solved that little pregnancy problem you had,” Lucifer says sadly, kneeling beside her, his cold, cold hand stroking her hair back from her face. “Can you guess where Dean is right now, because I know who that gun shot next, do you? Do you think he’s on the rack or do you think he picked Alistair’s knife up right when he got back?”

Cringing and flinching away from his touch, Sam crab walks to the edge of the road. She folds her knees to her chest and wraps her arms around them tightly, rocking back and forth. Her mind’s spinning, white noise building in her head, her heart beating frantically against her chest, nerve endings fraying and misfiring, feeling something in her brain cracking and welcoming it.

Lucifer sighs, stalks over to her and yanks her roughly to her feet, cradling her to his chest.

“Don’t you want to know why I brought you back to life Sammy, all warm, healthy and pink?”

Lucifer shoves his fingers against her forehead, snapping her head back, forcing her eyes to his.

“Look at me, Sam. Don’t you want to go back? Don’t you want to know why he believed killing you would save the world?”

Stunned and sickened by his smell, she barely has the energy to nod, a moan of despair escaping her lips. He won’t let her go. He’ll never let her go. Lucifer smiles and wraps his arm around her waist gently, his fingers sliding on her face, thumbing her tears away. “There’s something you need to do for me first.”

Leave me out with the wasteThis is not what I doIt’s the wrong kind of place To be cheating on youIt’s the wrong timeBut she’s pulling me throughIt’s a small crime and I got no excuse

dean

“Where’s Sam?” Bobby asks, returning from lighting the lanterns in the library.

Dean looks up from his guns spread along the kitchen table. “He’s outside, making sure the salt lines are still intact and checking the wards on the house.”

Bobby glares at him for a moment. “Not him, you idjit. The girl.”

“Don’t know,” Dean says, pushing the cleaning rod down the barrel of his shotgun. “I thought she was in her room.”

Bobby rolls to the front door and pulls it open, the coming darkness cold and foreboding. “No, I sent her out to siphon gas hours ago. She hasn’t been back since.” He stares out over the yard, hands on the arm rests of his wheelchair. “I got a bad feeling about this.”

Leaning back, Dean drops the shotgun on the table with a soft thunk. “So, maybe she went back to wherever she came from.”

Bobby wheels into the kitchen and opens up a kitchen drawer. “I don’t think it’s that simple,” he says, rolling into the room and throwing Dean a flashlight. “Go find her.”

Dean pushes one hand into the pocket of his jacket, kicking up dirt, his flashlight sweeping from crushed car to crushed car. He doesn’t want to be here, doesn’t want to be searching for a girl everyone else believes is Sam because he doesn’t believe it. He knows his brother like the air in his lungs and the blood in his veins and this girl ain’t Sam. He doesn’t know what the hell she did to convince Bobby and Sam, but he sure as hell ain’t having it.

He doesn’t like being this far from his brother, skin crawling at Bobby sending Sam to search for her on the other side of the yard, “Sam,” he calls halfheartedly, feeling stupid, the name rolling around in his mouth awkwardly. He stops for a moment and turns the flashlight, illuminating the path before him, something in the shadows catching his attention.

Someone’s on the other side of the trees and he moves closer, clicking the flashlight off, hearing voices. Twilight’s leaching the color from the surroundings, darkness settling in. He cocks his head to the side, recognizing the girl. Dean can see her face through a break in the trees, horror stricken, eyes wide and pupils blown. A man’s holding her up, covered in shadow, his large hand covering most of her face, forcing her to look up at him.

“Don’t you want to know why I brought you back to life here Sammy, all warm, healthy and pink?”

What the hell? Dean stands straight, stiffening when his boot snaps a branch under his foot. Lucifer! Oh, thank fucking Christ Sam’s on the other side of the yard.

“Look at me, Sam. Don’t you want to go back? Don’t you want to know why he believed killing you would save the world?”

Intrigued, Dean moves closer, intuition screaming at him to stay off the road. There’s something fascinating about the two of them and he might’ve thought for two seconds she was in cahoots with him if it weren’t for the expression on her face.

She’s fucking terrified.

Lucifer whispers something in her ear before thrusting her away from him. Straining to hear, Dean’s hand tightens on a sapling, watching her crumple to the ground.

Dean looks up, but Lucifer’s gone.

Sam bends forward on all fours, slowly pulling her legs under her and pushing off the road until she’s standing, swaying like an alcoholic. Wiping her face with her hands, she lurches forward, dropping a hand to her abdomen, spreading her fingers across it protectively.

Dean steals behind a tree, watching her pass by close enough to touch. Turning, he follows her through the yard until she stops in front of Bobby’s car, leaning forward, both hands on the hood of the Chevelle. She’s sobbing, chest hitching; her anguish stabbing deep in his gut. Finally, she wipes her face with her forearm and wrenches the driver’s side door open, sliding in. Her legs hang out the door, upper body lying on the seat.

Is she stealing—oh, that bitch totally is. Dean steps forward, walks right up behind her and clicks on the flashlight, suddenly illuminating her and the mess of wires in her fist. “The fuck you think you’re doing?”

Sam jumps and kicks out, the heel of her foot connecting with his side, surprise and pain spiking across his ribs. The flashlight goes flying backwards, spinning in the air, throwing funhouse shadows over them, landing in the dirt still lit. She’s on her feet outside of the car, fist catching him on the chin and rocking him backwards, another quick upward strike, smashing his nose with her left hand.

Dean brings up his arms to protect his face, definitely caught off guard by her savagery, defensively blocking her blows. Enough of this bullshit, he thinks, punching her in the gut but holding back, just enough to make her lose her breath. Then she steps away, planting her foot and spinning in a tight circle, catching him in the same fucking side as before with a solid roundhouse.

Unhgh, he breathes, falling forward and that’s fucking it, he’s done holding back. He smashes a fist into her face and she collapses back against the car. Dean grabs his jaw, moving it from side to side just as she’s pushing herself off the car and coming at him again, “Enough,” he roars. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will.”

“Fuck you,” she rasps, hair hanging in her face, wiping blood from her mouth with the back of her hand.

And her eyes, shit her eyes in the dim light from the flashlight, he’s seen those eyes before, looked at them almost every day for the past four years, they’re Sam’s eyes. So much like—the same as his Sam’s. He takes a step back; breath caught in his throat because he really didn’t believe it, thought it was a trick, a joke, a fucking mirage.

“Don’t you want to know why I brought you back to life here Sammy, all warm, healthy and pink?”

He believes now because she didn’t do it, she’s not the villain here, it wasn’t her fault and holy fucking hell, what’re they gonna do now?

Dean grabs her arms, locking them to her sides, dodging his head to the side when she tries to butt him in the nose with her forehead. “Knock it off Sam and talk to me. Why was Lucifer here? What’d he say to you?”

“You shot me,” she cries instead, shoving him forward before rocking him back, knocking him off balance enough to jerk a hand loose, punching at him, the angle all wrong, fist glancing off his chin. “It was you, you did it because I was—” she breaks off, another hard sob escaping her throat.

“No, no, no,” Dean says, picking her up, pulling her close and wrapping his arms around her. “It wasn’t me, I promise, it wasn’t me.”

She stares up at him, eyes red and swollen, face wet. “I was pregnant,” she spats, gathering his shirt in her fists, trying to shake him. “You fucking shot me because I was pregnant and you thought it was Rudy’s. The demons told you I was pregnant with an Anti-Christ and you believed them. Instead of just fucking asking me, instead of believing I wouldn’t, that I would never do that, instead of realizing it was yours,” she screams the last word and lightning flashes with a sudden sharp crack near them and Dean flinches, rapidly blinking away blindness. The smell of ozone burns his nose. The wind whips, twirling around them like a tornado, kicking up sand and leaves, sudden slashing rain falling from the sky in buckets, soaking them to the skin.

She’s doing something to him, painfully twisting his insides tight, her breath on his face complicating everything, breath mingling with his, making him see.

It’s just Sam standing before him.

A Sam he loves more than life itself, a Sam he went to Hell for, a Sam willing to give him—Jesus Christ, everything. Dean rakes a hand down his face; he’s cold, so fucking cold inside, because he’s wondering if he could’ve done this. He knows how he is, knows he can be a dick and jump to conclusions so fucking quick. Knows he would have believed she fucked a demon, because his brother fucked one.

And really, how could she love him? Didn’t she leave him and run away to California the first chance she got? Isn’t it the same fucking question he’s been asking himself since she was sixteen? She’s so fucking beautiful and he was in Hell for so long.

She slips through his arms, sliding to the ground, her wet hair hanging in her face, back against the car. The rain slacks off, dripping down their faces, the wind dying to almost nothing. She pushes her palms against her eyes and wipes them hard.

“Look, Sam—”

When she raises her face to his, his breath catches in his throat and he realizes, it fucking hits him right between the eyes, maybe yeah, he might’ve jumped to conclusions and yeah, he probably would’ve been a dick about it, but he would’ve never, never fucking raised a gun to her. If the other Dean loves her half as much as he loves Sam, he never could have shot her.

Dean kneels on the ground before her, grasping her cheeks in his hands and tells her this. “Think, Sam. Use that fucking big brain of yours,” she stares at him, eyes large and wounded. “Think about you and me. Would I, could I have done something like this?”

Sam shakes her head and starts to cry, “You don’t understand, I need, I need to go,” she sobs, fists falling against the ground, helpless. “I just don’t have it in me anymore. It’s too much—I can’t be here. I need to get out of here.”

Dean drops his hands and stares down at the top of her bowed head until she stops crying. “And go where? You don’t know anyone. This isn’t your world.”

“God,” she hiccups, shaking her head, “You can be such a dick.”

“Maybe I don’t want you to leave. Maybe I’m like invested now or something.”

Sam takes a deep breath, reaching above her and leveraging the car hood to help her stand. “Lucifer’s host is rotting out from under him. It won’t last much longer. He knows where I am and he’s coming back. He wants his vessel and it’s not me he’s after.”

Dean instinctively pushes her back against the car, forearm across her throat, “What did you do?”

Sam makes a fuck you noise in the back of her throat, same noise their dad used to make when Sammy used to get bitchy and then apologize, before the apologies stopped, before it got really bad, before they came to blows and black eyes, before Sam left them both for good.

Dean’s struck again, holy motherfucking shit, she really is Sam and he’s wondering just how the fuck he dealt with a girl up in his junk all the time with puberty, leg hairs dulling his razors and those boobs constantly near, a sister, then she’s shoving him, swiping her wet face with the arm of her borrowed hoodie. “Seriously, you need to ask me that question? I’m a fucking Winchester, you prick.”

Chuckling, he drops his arms and cradles her face in his hands, staring into her eyes. “I’m sorry,” he says soberly. “For what happened, in your world. What you remember I did to you.”

“Don’t move,” Dean says, stepping back a few feet, pointing a finger at her, pulling the walkie talkie out of his pocket with the other hand. “Yeah,” he says, “I’m here, and I found her. We’re coming up to the house now.”

“Okay,” Sam says, “I’ll meet you there.”

“Hey Sam,” Dean says into the walkie talkie, stretching his other hand to her, wagging it in a ‘come here’ gesture. She looks up at him in surprise when he grabs the back of her hand and starts to walk back to the house. “Ask Bobby to pull out those Enochian books, we’ve got some ancient runes to cast.”

“Wait,” she pulls on his hand and he stops, turning to face her.

Biting her lip, she looks at the ground for a moment, pushing her hair out of her face. “What I told you,” she glances up at him and their eyes meet and hold, “About us in our world, do you think—”

Dean makes a ‘get on with it gesture’ with his free hand. “Let’s go. I’m soaked and cranky.”

Dean flips through the pages of the book in his lap. “How are we supposed to know which ones to use?” He sends it flying onto the couch next to him in exasperation. “There’s like a million different symbols and meanings here. We could end up summoning the devil, not hiding her from him.”

Sam looks up the book on the desk, a smile breaking out on face. “Dude,” he says, standing and walking to the duffle bags in the corner of the room and pulling out a large brown envelope. “The x-rays. We can just copy what Castiel burned into our bones until we see him again, then we’ll ask him to do the same to her.”

Sam’s smile fades and he drops the bag. “She’s not an abandoned puppy, Dean.”

Picking up the book from the couch, Dean places it at the top of the pile on the desk. “Yeah, well except she kind of is.” Dean waves his hand. “Whatever, you know what I mean.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess then we are.” Sam pushes his hands into his front pockets, “I mean, until we can figure out how to get her home, she’ll stay with us.”

“Yeah, about that,” Dean says, walking into the doorway and looking out. Finding it empty, he grabs Sam’s arm and moves him back by the lit fireplace, telling him about Lucifer and her reactions, everything except the pregnancy revelation. He wants to save that for himself later, when Sam’s asleep and he can chew over it alone.

“So in the other world, you killed her?”

Dean shrugs his shoulders. “That’s what she remembers.”

Sam looks down at his brother, furrowing his eyebrows. “And that’s not pinging any alarm bells?”

“Sam,” Dean crosses his arms, “there were so many times in the past two years where I thought I might have to, you know,” he rakes a hand through his hair. “Hell, even Dad said—”

Sam steps closer to him. “I remember what Dad said.”

“Crap. Maybe I’m different there. Maybe we’re different there,” Dean remembers something Lucifer said. “Maybe I had a damn good reason for thinking killing you was going to save the world.”

Sam looks at the ceiling, shakes his head and chuckles. “Do you even hear yourself?”

“What?”

“We’re not the same person, Dean. She’s not me. Stop talking about us like we are. And you’re right. Maybe that Dean did have a damn good reason for killing her. Have you thought about that? And now she’s here and our problem.”

“You know, I would’ve expected a little more sympathy for yourself.”

“Dean, I got to tell you something, something about what I think I remember about—” he stops speaking and Dean looks up when Sam double takes. She’s standing in the doorway, wet hair slicked back into a ponytail, this time a pair of his sweatpants hanging off her hips and a faded YES concert t-shirt stretching across her chest. Dean’s eyes flick down, appreciating the size of her breasts when desire, hot and protective rushes over him. She looks so fucking small, swimming in his clothes.

Giving no inclination she heard any of their conversation, she walks further into the room and thumbs through one of the Enochian texts on the desk. “Have you found anything?”

Dean gives Sam a hard look behind her back. Sam shrugs his shoulders at him and stands next to her. “Well, right after Lucifer rose and the apocalypse began; Castiel burned Enochian sigils into our ribs. We’re hidden from both angels and demons now.”

“Oh,” she looks up at him and closes the book with a soft thud. She turns to the fireplace, absently rubbing her hands in front of the flames for warmth, “I guess that means I’m screwed, huh?”

Sam smiles down at her, plucking at the sleeve of her t-shirt, grabbing her attention again. “Not necessarily. Dean here decided he wanted to see just what the hell Castiel did to him.”

She glances over her shoulder at Dean, side smiling at the goofy grin on his face. “Oh, yeah, what’d you do?”

Sam pulls the x-ray out of the sleeve and holds it up with a flourish. She takes it from him and holds it up before the flames, staring at the transparency, the flickering sigils burned into his bones. “And people say I’m the smart one,” she murmurs, eyes traveling over the lines of ribs.

Dropping the film to her side, she turns to look at the two of them with a tremulous smile. “How are we going to do this?”

Dean glances at Sam. “What do you mean?”

She slides the x-ray on the desktop and sits in the chair, hand cradling her forehead, weary look on her face. “Are we going to burn them into my skin? Cut them into my chest? Are either of you or Bobby handy with a tattoo needle?”

Dean sinks back down on the red velvet couch, the idea of cutting into her skin physically repulsing him. He duck lips his mouth and spreads his hands. “I was thinking of maybe using a Sharpie. You know, writing them on your back.”

She sits up straight, glancing from one brother to the other and the surprise on her face twists a knot in his gut. How much fucking more pain did she think she was going to have to take?

“Writing them on my back? You mean it won’t hurt?”

Sam gathers the books from the desk and glances up at Dean with a frown, “No pain,” he promises, putting the books back on the shelves in the corner of the room.

She smiles, eyes crinkling in the corners just like Sam’s and something tightens around Dean’s heart. “Awesome. So who’s gonna do it?”

Dean and Sam glance at one another, sharing an uncomfortable look. “I mean, because I obviously can’t do it myself,” she says.

“I think we should rock paper scissors for it,” Sam says and Dean tilts his head, narrowing his eyes. Sam could either win or lose this depending on what he wants. Does he want?

“Both of us are going to need to do it,” Dean says, standing and walking to the desk. He invades her space, crowding her out of the way. He pulls the top drawer open and rifles through some pens and papers until he finds a few black Sharpies markers. Dean drops them on top of the x-ray and turns to his brother. “Go grab more lanterns and find out what Bobby’s doing.”

Sam nods, pursing his lips together in a frown. He looks from her to Dean before leaving the room. Dean leans back on the desk, hovering over her. “How are you?”

Sam shrugs her shoulders and puts her elbows on the desk, dropping her forehead into her hand and rubbing. “I’ll survive. I’m just so fucking exhausted.”

Dean glances up at the doorway, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Look, we’re gonna hide you from him, okay? Lucifer won’t be able to do what he did to you ever again. After we’re done with this, I want you to try and get some sleep.”

Fingers playing with a Sharpie, she sets it spinning. “Look, I’m not a freak. We weren’t freaks. Dean and me, we didn’t have anyone else.”

“Whoa, okay random. You don’t have anything to worry about. I didn’t say anything to Sam.”

“I know,” she says, hand slamming down on the spinning Sharpie before it goes flying off the desk. “He would’ve looked at me differently if he knew.”

Dean shakes his head, “Sam’s the most understanding guy I know. You’d be surprised at what he’s willing to accept, helluva lot more than me anyway,” he crosses his arms against his chest. “And I’m not looking at you differently,” Dean says with a twist to his lips. “Why do you think Sam would?”

“You are looking at me differently,” Sam gathers up the Sharpies and taps the ends of them against the desk, avoiding his eyes. “You’re softer now. More protective.”

“Very perceptive.”

“Why?”

Dean cups his hand around the back of her neck and tilts her face up to look at him. “This thing between us, it didn’t just happen in your world. The way I feel about you there is the way I feel about Sam here. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Dean chuckles and thumbs the line of her jaw, “No, I’m not gay. Trust me, I’m massively appreciative of women,” he glances down at her boobs again, idly wondering if they’re as soft as they look. “It’s just different with him. Because of the way we were raised or something, I can’t explain it. There’ll never be anyone else that way but Sam.”

She closes her eyes and nods her head, dropping her hand. He doesn’t. “We’re gonna take care of you, Sam. Protect you, try and get you home. Okay?”

“I don’t think there’s a home for me to go home to,” her voice thick with emotion. “Lucifer implied you were—my Dean was dead. What’s there for me to go back to if that’s true?” Sam wipes a hand across her eyes. “I’m sorry. God, I’m so tired of this,” she rubs her hands against the tops of her thighs. “I’m tired of my stomach churning and my eyes burning. I just want to stop feeling like this.”

Dean drops his hand from her neck and smiles down at her. “You’ve been through a lot. Understandable.”

They both look up when Sam comes around the corner. “Hey, Bobby’s on the shortwave with a hunter friend in Michigan. He’s getting the details, but it sounds like the rest of the supes are trying to take advantage of the decimated population. From what I was able to catch, we’ve got some vampires trying to set up a farm outside of Detroit.”

“Jesus fuck,” Dean says in disgust. “Sounds like our kind of job,” he looks down at her. “Do you think you’re up for it?”

She pushes back the chair and looks up at him in surprise, eyes flicking to Sam walking towards them with an extra lantern in his hand. “Me? Are you asking me to help, to come with you?”

“You’re a Winchester, right?” Dean asks, surprised once again by her resemblance to Sam when she smiles, her tongue touching her front teeth.